![]() “He has to get back to using that jab that made him so good,” said Steward as he and yours truly took a walk around the lower seating area at the new Yankee Stadium. It worked as Cotto once again became the prominent champion with the proper punch and foot work. Steward would train Cotto in South Florida and get him the proper sparring to prepare for his fight with Yuri Foreman at Yankee Stadium. With Cotto it was matter of getting the welterweight champion to adjust his style. The late boxing historian and author Bert Sugar once said about Steward, “He was as old school as they get come but had that new school mentality.” Time and time again he would go into his pocket and give them some monetary support. As much as he developed champions, the personal characteristic of becoming a second father, to his fighters was hardly noticed. The biggest issue was not giving Steward the acclaim he rightfully deserved. Prior to his induction, he told yours truly, “It is truly deserving, but the fighters who give their time and effort who make the sport as great as it is are more deserving.” He is the man who groomed Thomas Hearns and who built an iconic inner city gym in the working class capital of America.”īesides Hearns and Cotto, Steward also trained former heavyweight champion Lennox Lewis and he was inducted into the international Boxing Hall of Fame in 1997. ![]() Lampley said, on the passing of his longtime friend and ringside colleague, “He’s going to be most known as one of the greatest trainers in the history of the sport. He loved the sport of boxing and the fighters he trained gained more knowledge. There were never any negative words said about Steward, with the exception of one or two controversial remarks stated when analyzing a fight at ringside with Jim Lampley or Larry Merchant. Steward continued his efforts to keep the gym afloat and reportedly was giving part of his earnings from HBO and training to keep the gym in operation, which was situated in the inner city of Detroit and gained national recognition. It was a gym where champions were made for decades, including the Hall of Famer Thomas Hearns who had an epic fight with Marvelous Marvin Hagler. Steward was scheduled to be in the corner again November 10 th with Wladimir Klitschko for his heavyweight title defense against Mariusz Wach in Hamburg, Germany.Īnd there were reports that Steward was bankrupt as he continued to save the legendary Kronk Boxing Gym in Detroit Michigan to stay in business. He was objective at ringside and told it like it was. Or, the critics who quietly took their shots at Steward, including yours truly, believing that being in the corner of a fighter, who was also part of an HBO main event, was a conflict of interest.īut that never seemed to be an issue with Steward. Even Cotto at times, who believed that his other job at HBO caused him to take time away from the training, and that handling two or here fighters at a time, caused a conflict with the training schedule weeks before fight time. There were those who quietly took their shots at Steward. ![]() It was a brief tenure for Steward and Cotto, but those three fights, with Steward in the corner, revived Cotto, reverting, his style back to championship form. That relationship developed more when Steward took over training responsibilities for three-division world champion Cotto who was with Top Rank at the time. ![]() Samuels and Steward developed a great working relationship over the years with Hearns and recently working with Miguel Cotto when boxing returned to Yankee Stadium in the Bronx, New York. “A dear, caring person,” said Lee Samuels, the longtime publicist of Top Rank Boxing when informed that Steward passed away. He reportedly had complications after surgery last month, and as Steward did so many times over the years, telling his fighters in the gym, or in the ring, he fought to the end. He kept his illness quiet, a reported stomach ailment that went unnoticed, even with those on the inside at HBO Boxing where Steward became an astute analyst at ringside. In a sport that has changed, Steward went about his business and did it well as he did so many times with one champion after another. Emanuel Steward, who has died aged 68, was one of the foremost boxing trainers of his time having built a reputation for the all-action style of his fighters, he spent a decade coaxing Lennox Lewis to “hit more and think less”, eventually helping his man become the undisputed heavyweight champion of the world.Sadly we say goodbye to Emanuel Steward, the Hall of Fame boxing trainer who passed away early Thursday at the age of 68. ![]()
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